Genevra felt her heart turn cold; then something seemed to clutch her by the throat and choke the breath out of her body.  Through her brain went whirling the recollection of his last words to her that afternoon:  “They’ll find me ready if they come for trouble.”  She wondered if he had been ready for them or if they had surprised him!  She had heard the shots.  Chase could not have fired them all.  He may have fired once—­perhaps twice—­that was all!  The fusilade came from the guns of many, not one.  Was he now lying dead in that blazing—­She screamed aloud with the thought of it!

“Can’t something be done?” she cried again and again, without taking her gaze from the doomed bungalow.  She turned fiercely upon Bobby Browne, his countryman.  Afterward she recalled that he stood staring as she had stared, Lady Deppingham clasping his arm with both of her hands.  The glance also took in the face of Deppingham.  He was looking at his wife and his eyes were wide and glassy, but not with terror.  “It may not be too late,” again cried the Princess.  “There are enough of us here to make an effort, no matter how futile.  He may be alive and trapped, up—­”

“You’re right,” shouted Browne.  “He’s not the kind to go down with the first rush.  We must go to him.  We can get there in ten minutes.  Britt!  Where are the guns?  Are you with us, Deppingham?”

He did not wait for an answer, but dashed out of the garden and down the steps, calling to his wife to follow.

“Stop!” shouted Deppingham.  “We dare not leave this place!  If they have turned against Chase, they are also ready for us.  I’m not a coward, Browne.  We’re needed here, that’s all.  Good God, man, don’t you see what it means?  It’s to be a general massacre!  We all are to go to-night.  The servants may even now be waiting to cut us down.  It’s too late to help Chase.  They’ve got him, poor devil!  Everybody inside!  Get to the guns if possible and cut off the servants’ quarters.  We must not let them surprise us.  Follow me!”

There was wisdom in what he said, and Browne was not slow to see it clearly.  With a single penetrating glance at Genevra’s despairing face, he shook his head gloomily, and turned to follow Deppingham, who was hurrying off through the corridor with her ladyship.

“Come,” he called, and the Princess, feeling Drusilla’s hand grasping her arm, gave one helpless look at the fire and hastened to obey.

In the grand hallway, they came upon Britt and Saunders white-faced and excited.  The white servants were clattering down the stairways, filled with alarm, but there was not one of the native attendants in sight.  This was ominous enough in itself.  As they huddled there for a moment, undecided which way to turn, the sound of a violent struggle in the lower corridor came to their ears.  Loud voices, blows, a single shot, the rushing of feet, the panting of men in fierce combat—­and then, even as the whites turned to retreat up the stairway, a crowd of men surged up the stairs from below, headed by Baillo, the major-domo.